No Fear
by Drakes Equation
Summary: Ly Shepard doesn't have that thing that holds people back. The victim of years of neglect, how can this broken person save the universe? Not a one shot. Back story initially, but will progress to slightly left-of-cannon mass effect story line.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: I do not own mass effect, to my disgust. all props are bioware's, 'cept my original characters.**

**No Fear**

Ly Shepard was always a little different.

Not in the traditional sense, she didn't wear dark clothes or alone on rooftops. What Shepard did, or rather didn't do, was stop.

Ever.

Growing up in the slums of Earth should have seen the girl dead or whoring to get by, but Shepard doesn't lie down easily, or at all.

Shepard spent the first five years of her life beaten and ignored an animal in its own filth, a source of constant brutality for her degenerate murderer of a father or her whore of a mother. These familial terms are only loosely applicable here.

By the age of four, 30% of her body was covered in scar tissue. Just over a year later, she was sold to Gar's House of Flesh.

* * *

Her first night there, a man entered her room.

Later, shivering from the cold and the pain and the sheer bloody minded fury…

Something snapped.

Her arms and eyes glowed in the thin moonbeam permitted through the greasy patina of filth on the window.

The man sleeping on the other side of the bed was the first to die.

No warning was issued, nor quarter given. She stabbed both hands through his throat and tore outwards. A fine mist of blood sprayed her young features.

As she stood over the body, a vicious cycle of rage and pain fanned the flames of this new power inside her. The pressure built inside her as her mind revisited all the beatings she had ever experienced, and from this a new consciousness took form inside her skull. It was hurt. It was **not** scared. It **was **angry.

Coldly, with a sort of detached satisfaction, this terrifying sentience looked down on the decapitated corpse, and smirked with the smugness of a general in victory. She turned her gaze to the door. She was not smiling anymore.

Later as the police arrived to the calls of a few of the better treated women of Gar's establishment, hardened officers felt rather queasy at the sight therein. A young patrolman who was first on the scene retched desperately in the gutter. Four clients and two of Gar's "Bigs" were torn apart in a visceral display in the main atrium, but the most disturbing sight was the owner himself. He was neatly bisected form head to groin hanging by his legs from the chandeliers.

Some of the more coherent girls later described a "glowing girl" furiously butchering the men with a rictus a hatred plastered on her face. Another had heard a new girl being brought in, addressed as "Ferin's brat". A quick search led them to the house of the mother and father.

There were no whole people in the house.

* * *

Ly crouched in the gutter, cold and sore, but content. She had tasted her power, and she had felt joy in the havoc she had wrought. Quietly, she stole through the streets in search of shelter, and finding a store with a glass frontage, formed a glowing blue blade from the end of her fist. Cutting a small hole in the left corner, she crawled through, nicking her shoulder on the sharp edge as she entered.

The next morning, the manager of the rather pricey fashion boutique Grahams on York, unlocked the door and strolled in to find a filthy, bloodied urchin passed out on a nest of fine Remin-fur coats imported from Sarave-5. The manager, a shy and retiring man, thought it best to back out of the shop a call the police on his omnitool. Ten minutes later they arrived.

As Ly opened her eyes a blue-shirted officer filled her vision. With a snarl she sprang up and blasted him off his feet with a ball of blue fire, sending him smashing into a case of high-end jewellery. Only the speedy reactions of his partner saved the man from a second hit as at the first sign of biotics, he drew his sidearm and sank three tranq charges into the small of her back. As they immediately began to take effect, the girl spun around and started shambling straight for the officer. As the officer swore and shot again, her movements slowed and eventually halted less than a metre from the officer. The man cuffed her quickly with a biotic neutralizer and ran over to check on his partner, who was stil groaning on the floor. "jesus" he exclaimed "it took me eight tranks to but the little bitch down" as he helped the other officer to his feet. The man wheezed "we'd better get her to the precinct before she wakes up Paulie, I ain't to fond of gettin' my fucking ass kicked again."

* * *

Captain Reem of New York precinct 97 was getting old, and had seen decades worth of street toughs and more than his fair share of killers, but even he had never seen anything like the young girl restrained in room three. As he stood in the hallway, looking through the glass, the lights dimmed as the technicians in the room with her attempted to reinforce the biotic dampeners on her bindings. The malevolence in her glare, coupled with the bursts of hear her biotics were generating was partly responsible for the sweat beading their brows.

The other part was a result of their imaginations of what would transpire should they fail.

Reem breathed a quiet sigh of relief as one of the technicians let out a loud "whoop" of triumph as an equivalence point between the maximum surge potential of the girl was reached. The others slumped in fatigue as Reem dismissed both them and the officer who had been drafted to aim an incapacitator at the base of her skull, targeting a major nerve cluster. The old man continued to watch with fascination as over the next hour as the 4 ft 3 inch, 40 kilo girl with rage etched on every feature continued to struggle and pound away at her restraints until eventually slipping into unconsciousness.

**The first chapter of my first attempt at any sort of creative writing. This is not a one-shot, but it will cover some background on Shepard before Mass effect 1. Eventually Liara and Shepard. I will be following the general mass effect story arc when I get to it, but i reserve the right to change whatever I want.**

**I pulled inspiration from this from a lot of different places, stories, authors ect, so if anyone has any concerns, please message me and I will endeavor to address them.**

**This is my first outing, so praise and CONSTRUCTIVE critisimsm is most welcome. Trolls will be peeled and rolled into a barrel of salt and snakes.**

**Drake**


	2. Chapter 2

**And we are back. Sorry it took a week, but my uploads are likely o be a bit sporadic, so please bear with me.**

**All characters are Bioware's. They just followed me home one day.**

No fear

Chapter 2

Dr Karen Sharahall got the call at three in the morning. This wasn't an unusual occurrence for her; word of mouth about her results with children had certainly done its rounds in the New York psychiatric community. She loved kids, and helping them professionally was just as natural progression for her. Still, that didn't make a three AM call out any more fun.

* * *

The precinct was still buzzing when she arrived, which she found a little odd, but she put that in the back of her mind as she speculated on what could get her called in at this hour. She had known Greg Reem since a talk three years ago on youth crime prevention, and he had always impressed her with his progressive opinions on helping young offenders.

She was waved through the scanners and an officer escorted her to the holding cells. Outside cell 6, she found the Captain sitting by the glass.

"Greg, it's great to see you again" she greeted warmly, as the captain stood up somewhat stiffly and returned her smile. "Glad you're here, Karen. This one is way out of my league" he replied as he hit the panel to open the door.

Karen was shocked to see a small, dirty body suspended in a star position from four sparking restraints. "Greg, what the hell is this". She quickly crossed to the small figure and checked her pulse. Finding a strong heartbeat, she turned angrily on Captain Reem. "Get her down from there!" she shouted. Reem put a calming hand on her shoulder. "Those are there for her protection and ours as well, Karen". He moved over to the machinery hooked into the bindings. "These are biotic dampeners, Karen. They generate an opposing charge to any biotic fields she generates. We had to put three of them in series to get the power we needed to restrain her." He explained while motioning to the Med-Mech in the corner to wake her up.

"We had to keep her sedated in order to feed her, she fights her bindings until she passes out." As the mech prepared the injection, Karen asked "so why is she here?" "She was picked up by a patrol unit responding to a break in at a fashion boutique. When the officers woke her up, she attacked them. She sent Parker through a display case and cracked his ribs. Jensen took eight trank pellets to put her out."

"We put that together with the reports last night of a glowing being tearing apart a brothel and shredding a couple of ex-cons in the Bronx. She racked up quite the body count, ten in the morgue, and all of them in pieces." He rubbed his eyes with fatigue as he continued. "We tested the bodies against her DNA, and the couple were a match. From the looks of those scars on her, I'd say they didn't fit the definition of loving parents. Probably sold the girl to the whorehouse. You've got your work cut out for you, doctor."

Karen had experienced troubled kids before, but the situation of the diminutive figure before her shocked her. "Has she said anything?" "No, just screaming and fighting. It's like she doesn't understand stopping for your own good. She just keeps fighting."

* * *

Ly started to wake, and was confronted by a kind looking young women with browned skin and reddish brown hair. This person was peering at her like a new discovery. Ly didn't like that. She head-butted her, cracking into the bridge of her nose, and then started straining against her bindings, sparking charges off the manacles. "Karen!" shouted the old man who was watching her earlier as he rushed to her side. The woman grabbed her nose and reassured the man with a wave and an "I'm fine" as she wiped her eyes of the reflex tears. The woman straitened and resumed watching the angry young child, a look of concern crossing her face as she witnessed the savage fury in those eyes as they bored into hers. Eyes full of pain. Steeling herself, she stepped closer and laid her hand on the girl's cheek. The small figure froze, and a perplexed look graced her dirtied features. She was being touched, but it didn't hurt. She snarled at the old man as he attempted to pull the doctor back, and when he retreated, returned to studying the eyes of this strange woman.

Karen watched as the confusion crossed over the young child's features and realised that she was probably unused to contact that did not result in pain. As the child began the stir restlessly, the doctor spoke to her. "Hello there, I'm Karen. No one here is going to hurt you. Can you tell me your name?"

Shepard remembered the word her mother always screamed at her when she wanted something, and thought that was probably her name. "Ly" she grunted through a throat worn hoarse by screams. She still didn't know what was happening, but that calm, soothing tones of the woman, coupled with her soft smile, compelled the young biotic to respond. The faint, sweet smell of the doctor's shampoo, a cinnamon and lilac combination, was a further new experience, and put her in mind of her earliest memories, when her mother had showered her in the sink.

The woman's features softened further as the young child's stomach sounded with a deep rumble. "Are you hungry, Ly" she asked as she removed her hand and stepped back.

"Yes" was Ly's answer as she glanced suspiciously around the room, registering its various features for the first time.

Karen's heart went out to the small creature before her. "Alright sweetie, we'll get you some food, but you need to keep calm, okay?" she pleaded as the figure began to pull on her restraints again. She watched as the small torches of her eyes scanned her face, searching for any duplicity. Finding nothing that indicated deception, the child stilled, and the gauges around the room slowly wound down as she ceased exerting her considerable force on the tortured machines.

Karen exhaled silently as the small figure relaxed, still studying the room, like she was measuring the angles, planning her moves. Karen motioned to the Captain, looking astonished in the corner as he witnessed this transformation, to follow her out into the hall as she backed away slowly, adding "Ok then, I'll be back with some food in a little while. You have my word on that." She slowly moved into the corridor, feeling slightly relieved to be out from under that penetrating gaze.

* * *

She shivered from the cold in the corridor, and turned to the captain as he touched her shoulder. "That was amazing, Karen. How did you do that?". She replied with a fatigued "I'm trained to analyse expressions in people, particularly children. What worries me, though, is that in that entire encounter, I witnessed hate, rage, confusion and suspicion, but absolutely no fear. I mean, a young girl waking up in a strange place, with strange people watching her should have terrified her, but there was not even a flicker. She was cold as ice when I touched her, too." "What does that mean?" the captain asked with a perplexed expression on his face. "I don't know yet" Karen replied pensively, "but you were right about one thing Greg. I do have my work cut out for me."

"Now, first things first, let's find her something to eat" she declared as they walked down the corridor to the squad room.

**Greetings readers, hope you enjoyed that. We will be speeding up the story slightly after the next chapter, and any ideas for plot points will be taken on their own merit, as well as acknowledged at the start of a chapter. Please review, I thrive on feedback, so feed the machine.**

**Trolls will be called names and dangled over my lava pit.**

**Drake**


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